Shreds of a Man
by Unfathomed Stars
Summary: Three years after Gus's death, Van Houten is old, sad, and left with his memories. But a letter from a familiar person might change his life forever.


**Author's Note: The Fault in Our Stars belongs to John Green, aka my favorite human being. **

He's been in a hospital bed for as long as he can remember. The days have all blended into an endless stream of sleeping, Tums, and listening to that same Swedish rap tape that he'd shown off on the day those kids came to visit so many years ago.

He flips through a novel. Books are his only escape these days, since he'd had a stroke and been kept in the hospital to keep him, quote unquote, safe. He's just started to feel that buzz in his heart that he used to associate with excitement when he hears a knock at the door. Just his nurse bringing him the Sunday paper.

"Just slide it under the crack!" He shouts, always one for his privacy. But as always, the knob opens anyway.

"Mr. Van Houten?" The nurse asks.

"Yeah?"

"You got a letter." This makes him stop short. A letter? No one even knows he's in the hospital. He is a Van Houten: rich, snobby, pretentious. A old drunk like him is a smudge on their perfect family tree. He is shunned by his family for the way of life he was thrust into after the death of his daughter. Having a huge amount of pride, he has not contacted any of his living family members to tell them where he is. And the alcoholic, lonely lifestyle that made him lose his family has erased the possibility of friends. So a letter? Unusual.

The nurse hands it to him, nervously, anticipating a verbal lashing like she's used to. But he remains oddly quiet, staring at the return address. It's a name he hasn't seen in years.

Lidewij Vliegenhart.

The name brings back painful memories. Losing the last person who willingly spent time with him, even though he paid her to do it, was difficult. But that's nothing compared to the grief and anger that fills up his body until it is ready to explode when he thinks of those kids. Especially her. Hazel Grace Lancaster. He remembers her like they saw each other yesterday. How she showed up at his door, a spot on portrayal of his dead daughter, her life story predicting to be as short as hers had been. He feels so ashamed when he thinks about how he treated her, the terrible things he said. And he never gave her her ending, the closure she needed so badly. And why would Lidewij be writing to him? They hadn't spoken since the day he gave her Augustus's… Oh God.

He forces himself to open the letter, his fingers moving as slowly and carefully as if he was stopping a time bomb. He slides the paper out of it's envelope, and his eyes fall right to the words he desperately doesn't want to see.

_Peter,_

_You don't know how hard it was to track you down. I went to your old home in Amsterdam, and when you weren't there, I assumed you were dead. I needed to know for sure, so I checked every hospital and retirement home in the country until I finally found your name._

_I am writing to you with very sad news. Hazel Lancaster passed away last week. She has been fighting a losing battle during the three years since I have seen you, but her body finally had enough. _

_You must remember Augustus's death, when he sent you notes for an eulogy for Hazel. You read them and kept a copy before you sent them to her. Yes, I know. Augustus's last wish was that you eulogize Hazel at her funeral, since he won't be able to. Use the notes. Find Augustus's Hazel in his words. The funeral is at the same church where Augustus's was held three years ago, on September 21st. Please, please come. You know you owe them that._

_Lidewij Vliegenhart _

What are these things falling in his eyes? He remembers them as tears. After his daughter died, he had thought that he'd cried enough tears to last a lifetime, but he had obviously saved a few for the death of the girl he had thought was her ghost. He didn't want to go, didn't want to face it. He just wanted to hide from his problems with the help of lots and lots of alcohol, like he usually does. But he knew that was impossible. He never had given her her ending, her closure. This was his final chance to right his old wrong.

A week. He has a week to convince the nurses to let him leave, get on a plane, and fly to Indiana. He knows that this will be much easier if he can manage to skip the 'convince the nurses' part, so he quietly sneaks out of the room. He walks with his head down to the lab, where there are rows and rows of computers available for patients that are still mobile. He logs on, and just like old times, buys a first class ticket on the only airline he can find where drinks are included. He charges it to his impressive bank account, still huge thanks to the fact that he hasn't indulged in anything since his LAST first class ticket to Indiana for Gus's funeral.

The flight leaves at 4:30 the following day. He figures that since he is only staying until the funeral, he just needs a suit and a normal change of clothes. Now how to get out…

Simple. He walks out the door of his room, then out the door of the hospital. Asking means opening yourself up to the chance of a no. So he won't ask. He boards a bus, and walks down the familiar lane that holds his house. It's been a while, but his muscle memory takes over as he walks around the bend, down his driveway, and unlocks the door. It smells disgusting, a mixture of old puke and alcohol. He isn't here to revisit the past, so he walks to his room, pulls out his clothes, and locks the door again.

A quick stop at the ATM finishes his preparation. He goes to an old pub, orders their most expensive scotch, and waits. He sits there for hours, putting up with the odd glances people shoot him, not caring about the whispers they send back and forth, wondering if he is still breathing, wondering why on earth a man that old is at a bar, alone, this late at night.

Eventually, after all of the customers finally leave, he picks up his bag, heads to the airport, and boards the plane when 4:30 rolls around. He was right, he does break even, sending the waitress back and forth and back and forth to get him more and more drinks, until he is too drunk to form coherent thoughts or words, until he is barely able to shout for another bottle. At some point, when the window shows a pink streaked sky, something clicks in his foggy brain. Hazel. Funeral. Eulogy.

Until the plane lands, he reads over Gus's last words to him to the point where he has them almost committed to memory. The six cups of coffee cleared up his mind, and he uses the scraps of his old genius to make a passable, if not incredible eulogy.

When he makes it to the church, a crowd is already forming around the center. Her casket. He cautiously edges through the mob, and forces himself to look. Her green eyes are open, and her mouth is parted in a way that makes her look like she's about to say something. She looks different then he remembers, maybe because her image was fused with his daughter's over time.

He sits through the first part of the service. The parents speak. A cousin or someone speaks. A blind kid speaks. Then it's his turn.

He goes through his prepared eulogy on autopilot, barely taking in what he was saying. The sense of déjà vu is so thick that you could cut it with a knife. When he reaches the end of the memorized words, he pauses.

"You know what? This is stupid. All of this. These are the words of Augustus Waters, another kid who bit it from cancer before he reached anywhere near his peak. They were good kids. And cancer took them. Like it took her. They were good kids. She looks like her." He's rambling, he feels the stares, but he can't stop.

"She looks like her and she didn't get her ending and she didn't get her ending but I could give her this one and I didn't and now she's dead but she didn't get her ending. And it's too late to give it to her."

The entire room is in shock, staring at the man who obviously lost his mind.

"I have to go," he says, and thousands of eyes follow him as he heads for the door, almost leaves, and comes back as if to say something else. He hesitates. "I hope they both know I'm sorry."

With that, he grabs a bottle from the reception table, brings it to his lips, and staggers out. He takes a seat on the curb and drinks until the bottle is empty. Now that its empty, what can he do now? Eighty nine years, old, drunk and alone on a sidewalk, while that girl with so much potential died at nineteen? He remembers what he heard Augustus say to Hazel as they left on that day just three years ago.

The world is not a wish granting factory.

The most true thing he'd ever heard.

And now, he can't think of anything else he is capable of doing but sitting here, his knuckles white against the empty bottle, watching that pink sun disappear behind the trees.

**Author's Note: First TFIOS story. How'd it go? Please review. I love your feedback! Bye guys:) **


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